Naas GAA club have confirmed Rory Gallagher will be part of their senior football management team for the upcoming season.
Joe Murphy will remain at the helm of the four-in-a-row Kildare champions for a fourth season and has added the former Derry manager to his coaching team for 2025.
Gallagher stepped down as Oak Leaf manager in May 2023 after his former wife, Nicola, made allegations of domestic abuse, though a PSNI investigation brought no charges.
The former Donegal and Fermanagh manager had been coaching Monaghan side Corduff until recently and was linked with a return to the Derry position following Mickey Harte’s departure last year, but ultimately that did not materialise.
In a statement, Naas GAA said: “Joe Murphy has been reappointed into the role of Naas senior football manager for 2025. Joe has confirmed that his management team will consist of Rory Gallagher, Pádraic Cribben, Kevin Martin, Martin Sweeney and Fionn Higgins.”
Naas have dominated the Kildare senior football championship in recent years and have claimed six consecutive county hurling titles.
However, the footballers have come up short in their bid for a maiden Leinster senior title over the past four seasons – losing three times to Kilmacud Crokes (twice in the provincial final) before falling to Cuala in this season’s quarter-final in November.
Last February, Gallagher successfully overturned his temporary debarment from the GAA by the Ulster Council, and in September the former Fermanagh player made clear he intended to return to intercounty management, increasing speculation linking him with the Derry vacancy.
Gallagher managed Derry to an Ulster title in 2022 and remained with the county for the start of the 2023 season before stepping down in the lead-up to that year’s provincial decider.
Derry was the last county to appoint a senior football manager for 2025, with the protracted search lasting from July to November. It was believed several Derry players were keen on Gallagher returning, but the county board instead opted to appoint Paddy Tally as manager.
Speaking in November, Derry midfielder Brendan Rogers praised Gallagher’s time with the team and said he expects his former manager to make a return to intercounty management in the near future.
“I can’t see why he wouldn’t. There’s been a lot of things went on in the background and that’s his personal life but he’s very capable of being an intercounty manager, he has one of the best IQs in the game, so look, I’d be very surprised if somewhere down the line if he didn’t get an intercounty post because life has to move on as well too,” said Rogers.
“It’s not wrong to say that a lot of players would have an affection to how Rory Gallagher coached us.
“Ultimately, he did get us all our senior success and there’s a love for how he treated the players and they got on very well with him so I would imagine that’s where the speculation came from.
“I don’t think any player that played under him thought that he wasn’t a good coach or good at what he did.”
Meanwhile, the GAA’s Central Competitions Control Committee (CCCC) will on Monday confirm the throw-in times for the postponed All-Ireland club senior football semi-finals. The games had been due to take place on Sunday but were called off due to weather.
Both matches have been set for next Saturday at their original venues – Coolera-Strandhill meeting Cuala at Breffni Park in Cavan, while Dr Crokes face Errigal Ciaran at O’Moore Park in Portlaoise.
The All-Ireland club football and hurling finals are scheduled to be played on January 19th at Croke Park.
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